


you left me but it's whatever

by halfwheeze



Category: Welcome to Hell, Welcome to Hell - All Media Types
Genre: M/M, jonathan schmoop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-11
Updated: 2018-11-11
Packaged: 2019-08-21 21:36:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16584641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/halfwheeze/pseuds/halfwheeze
Summary: sock's been gone for five days. jonathan isn't doing what the kids would call coping.





	you left me but it's whatever

**Author's Note:**

> this isn't my best work but my best friend angrily told me to publish and thus.

It’s kind of ironic, how much seeing Sock every single day of his life actually makes Jonathan want to die less. His demonic friend is sunshine more than hellfire, a sweet smile more than sharp smirks, and when Sock is more or less missing for more than a couple of hours, Jonathan surely notices. He’s been  _ noticing  _ for five days straight (there’s a joke here, but he can’t make himself make it), and the tight feeling in his chest just isn’t going away anymore, no matter how he tries to distract himself. Sleep isn’t coming to him and he feels panicked, the tight feeling tensing into a lump, his teeth clenched. He isn’t falling asleep tonight, but he doesn’t know how to seek Sock out either. 

How does one get into contact with a demon? Some kind of sacrifice? Jonathan shoves the temptation down his own throat and turns over, pressing his face hard enough into the pillow that he can almost hope he suffocates. Sock would get what he wanted, then. 

 

At some point, though he knows it must have been past three in the morning, Jonathan must have fallen asleep. He had tossed and turned enough in his sleep as to tangle his sheets around his person, his legs so completely wrapped that he’s not sure where his skin ends. He’s not so sure he’s woken up when his blaring alarm startles him, because rather than looking directly at it, a body is in his way. The alarm stops when the body leans forward, and then the body turns around. As Jonathan has hazarded to guess it might be, Sock looks at him now, his usual manic grin in place. Relief washes through Jonathan like a tide, swelling in his chest like the lump that had just been there last night. 

He doesn’t think about it before his arms wrap around Sock’s shoulders, pulling him close for a moment, putting his face in Sock’s hair and squeezing him tighter before letting him go. It feels good just to have him around again, Jonathan’s spirits rising without his permission or thought. Sock’s shoulders stiffen after a moment and then relax all together, and then vibrate a little with speech, but that part might be Jonathan’s imagination. He’s not touching his counterpart much anymore, but he can still kind of feel it. 

“You okay, hot stuff?” Sock asks, the demon’s voice high and bright, and even the usually annoyingly bad nickname is a relief. Jonathan has to swallow before even thinking of an answer. The nicknames have always given him a slight pause, wondering at what they meant before throwing it away; there was no way Sock could mean anything by it. He’s supposed to make Jon kill himself. Jonathan untangles his legs from the blankets and sheets and what all else before he responds, having already stalled for too long, debatably. 

“Yeah, I’m fine,” he says, clearing his throat before phasing through Sock to get up, collecting his clothes to take a shower. If he didn’t give the demon time, he couldn’t ask questions Jonathan didn’t want to answer. No happy go lucky demon needs to hear about Jonathan’s abandonment issues - no one does at all. He’s never even talked about it with his mom. 

Sock makes a noise of casual disapproval, like he’s not invested enough to fight. “Sounds fake but okay,” he chirps, but he doesn’t say anything else while Jonathan is roving his room, looking for the boxers he  _ knows  _ he laid out yesterday. “Desk chair,” Sock announces and - lo and behold, he’s correct. 

“Thanks,” Jonathan murmurs before darting into the bathroom, a negotiated safe zone from haunting (he only had to fall down in the shower twice before Sock tapped out - it apparently didn’t count if he fell and died completely on accident, even if it was, in all reality, Sock’s fault). His mind does not clear even as steaming water pours over his head only a minute later, still rushing with equal mixture of misplaced worry and potent relief. The confusion is enough to irritate Jonathan, who usually gravitates toward annoyed anyway (depending on how deep his mood swings get). By the time he’s clean, he’s irked by both himself and Sock, and doesn’t really want to talk to the latter at all. That doesn’t mean the demon won’t try, Jonathan notes while putting on his clothes for the day. 

“Jonathan?” Sock calls from Jonathan’s bedroom, though Jonathan doesn’t even consider answering. “Jon,” he makes the one syllable sound like approximately eight, accented by whining. “Pay attention to me,” he says, instead of “Explain yourself” or “What was that about?” like Jonathan had feared. The blonde boy turns down the hallway to go back to his room instead of down the stairs, as he had planned to avoid the demon for as long as possible. Sock is smiling again when Jonathan comes back to him, almost enough to make the human smile himself. Almost. 

“Okay, I’m paying attention to you. What?” Jonathan says, banking on distraction rather than anything else. Sock puts his hands on his hips and cocks one out, looking more suburban mother of two point five children than teenager come demon. He looks at Jonathan with a taste of analysation before breaking back into his usual smile, and the knot in Jonathan’s chest is loosened considerably. Sock’s head tilts as he floats closer to Jonathan though, and he gets entirely too close to point at something in the range of Jonathan’s eyes or cheekbones or something - his face anyway. 

“The bags under your eyes are even worse than usual, hot stuff. Thought you’d at least sleep better while I was gone,” the demon points out, worrying at the skin with his finger. It took a moment for Jonathan to realise that he must want Sock to touch him then, and focusing on changing his own mind until the finger just phases through his cheekbone. 

“Be careful with the bags under my eyes, they’re vintage. Now, I’ve gotta get ready for school, and I’m not letting you make me late for the bus. Again,” Jonathan glares, but it’s softer than usual and he knows it, so he turns around instead of trying to watch Sock’s expression. He doesn’t want to think about the where and why of how long Sock was gone this time, so Jonathan focuses on his next task: breakfast. He stalks towards the stairs and resolutely does not make sure that his demon counterpart is following. 

Sock seems to be resistant to speaking for a few moments as well, though he may just trying to figure out exactly why Jonathan is being so strange. Anxiety crawls into his throat and chokes out any more words Jonathan might have forced himself to say, and he’s kind of glad for it, in all the wrong ways. Nothing seems real until he’s already down the stairs and looking into the fridge, only mildly sure he walked here of his own accord. Sock’s head is sticking out of the leftovers on the second shelf; this shouldn’t be comforting and normalised to Jonathan’s life, but here he is, holding back a smile at the antics of the demon that haunts him. Honestly, what the fuck is his life? He doesn’t grin when he closes the door on Sock’s so called humor, but it’s a close thing. 

“This is not what paying attention to me looks like. Jon,” Sock drags out the nickname again, whining and following him to the table. Jonathan sets down his cereal and milk and bowl and spoon all very dramatically before turning back to Sock. 

“Is this what paying attention to you looks like?” he asks, deadpan and with a single eyebrow raised. Sock’s grin is a soft thing that Jonathan doesn’t want to think about, so he goes back to his cereal before the demon can reply. He just wants things to be normal, completely without this weird mood ballooning in his chest, but it doesn’t seem to be going away. Like most things, Jonathan solves the problem by ignoring it, and its cause; namely, he ignores Sock, who does not take kindly. Sock floats into his vision and Jonathan makes eye contact with him while taking a bite of cereal, knowing well enough to at least act like he isn’t affected at all. Sock sighs, a signal of the human’s victory. 

“Why are you being so  _ weird _ ? Pay attention to me,” Sock whines, and Jonathan nearly stops breathing. Sock’s not supposed to notice he’s being weird, and Jonathan is supposed to not care if Sock notices or not. 

“I’m not being weird. Time to catch the bus,” is all Jonathan answers with, setting his bowl and spoon in the sink. He puts up the milk and grabs his headphones, running out of the house like he’s being chased. Well, he more or less is being chased, only by a demon who can float through walls and floors and ask him personal questions rather than a trampling monster. Sock sighs even though he doesn’t have to breathe, and Jonathan puts his headphones on rather than letting him talk. The demon sits beside him without bothering him for once, and Jonathan ignores how much he  _ doesn’t  _ like that. The bus ride passes both quickly and like it crawls. Sock drags him immediately to a janitor’s closet of some sort, and Jonathan realises that he must want Sock to touch him again. Ugh. 

“Seriously, Jonathan. What’s going on?” the demon asks once they’re alone, doing his best to look strict. 

“Nothing,” Jonathan replies simply, and it sounds fake to his own ears, but he’s not going to say anything more.

“Sulky, ignoring me, and letting me touch you is not a normal combo, hot stuff. What’s going on?” Sock asks again, not taking no for an answer. And thus, the word vomit. 

“You left me, but it’s whatever. You were only gone for five fucking days. It’s whatever,” Jonathan answers before bailing out right of the closet and into the crowded hallway. There’s a joke here, but Jonathan can’t make it, though he normally mentally would. Sock follows him for the rest of the school day in mostly silent version of himself, and Jonathan totally isn’t minorly freaking out. Classes pass together like boring-subject soup, American History and English II blurring into one period before the bell rings. Lamenting his freedom silently, Jonathan speedwalks to his bus, slamming his headphones on. Sock sits beside him on the bus and says nothing until they get home. 

“You’re not supposed to miss me,” Sock whispers into the quiet of Jonathan’s bedroom, balancing on the edge of his bed. Jonathan’s shoulders fall without his permission and he leans back against his headboard, a sigh falling from his lips. 

“And yet,” is all he says in reply, revealing more than he’d like in the span of two simple words. He doesn’t want to explain that having Sock around is the highlight of his day, that he used to feel so alone, that Sock feels more like a childhood imaginary friend. He doesn’t want to explain the abandonment problems still fresh in his chest, or how much more likely he would be to kill himself  _ without  _ the demon. Sock starts reaching towards him and stops in midair; something in the range of Jonathan’s chest feels cracked open. 

“Why?” Sock asks, looking down at his skirt and brushing his hands over it. Jonathan shrugs. He doesn’t know why he missed Sock - except that he does, and everything sucks, because Sock is a literal demon and Jonathan’s romantic orientation is a fucking sloppy mess. But, yeah, he totally just doesn’t know. 

“I just did,” he says, reaching out a hand for his headphones to effectively end the conversation. Sock places a hand on his wrist that doesn’t phase through, just looking at him for a second, before leaning in to kiss Jonathan.

It’s like nothing he’s even felt before. He had known, realistically, that Sock was a demon, and that Sock is dead. Now, with his tongue in Jonathan’s mouth, he knows the strange mix of fire-hot and ice-cold, and he’s addicted to it as soon as they start. It’s obvious that Sock didn’t have much experience when he was alive, but Jonathan doesn’t have much experience either, so it’s all the same. Jonathan puts a hand on the curve of Sock’s jaw, tilting his head ever so slightly to better the angle. Suddenly, it’s a lot better. They have to pull back eventually so that Jonathan can breathe, but he puts their foreheads together to sustain contact. 

“Oh,” Sock says, moving his head onto Jonathan’s shoulder. Their closeness warms Jonathan through, and he wishes he could still conjure the mask of being annoyed. He nearly misses not feeling anything for the overwhelming quality of softness in his chest. The hand on Sock’s jaw moves and wraps around the bone of his hip, and Jonathan feels settled. Sock settles onto the bed next to him, laying down for the first time that Jonathan has ever seen in his entire haunting. 

“Are you staying?” Jonathan asks, voice brittle with his inability to keep himself together even now, with Sock in his arms seemingly to stay. Sock hugs him a little tighter now, holds him a little closer. 

“As long as I can, Jon. Get some sleep.” 

**Author's Note:**

> send me prompts @halfwheeze on tumblr or in the comments.


End file.
